Dorothy's BookMy Town
by Melissa7
Summary: We all know Dorothy wrote a book but we only have a few clues as to what it actually said. Well now it's here...Dorothy's book as I imagine her to have written it.
1. Chapter 1

My Town

From the day I walked into Colorado Springs, battered, confused, terrified, this town helped me put my life back together. The folks here are strong and good-hearted. They have been my salvation and inspiration. I dedicate this volume to them with my gratitude and love.

Dorothy Jennings

Chapter 1: The Colorado Springs of My Past

My folks moved to Colorado Springs from Kansas after Daddy's pa died. The farm he'd grown up on and worked for his entire life now belonged to his older brother, my Uncle Rick. Daddy wanted his own place so he packed up his new bride and headed west to a place where new opportunity waited.

Before long the farm was up and running and my parents decided it was time to start a family. Daddy wanted big strong boys to work on the farm and carry on the family name. All he got was girls-me and my older sister Maude. We worked just as good as any boy could have but Daddy still wouldn't even consider leaving us the farm when he passed. Ownership of land was a man's world and two young females could never have handled it-not as far as daddy was concerned. It was up to Maude and I, then, to find husbands Daddy thought suitable to take over his beloved farm.

The farm was a ways outside of Colorado Springs but that is where I met my husband. Once a month we'd go into town to visit the mercantile, then owned by Darren Bray. He and his wife Marianne had lived in Colorado Springs all their lives and worked up a good business. They were always kind to me and Maude when we came to do the shopping. Maude eventually married their son, Loren, but I had bigger dreams than staying in town allowed. I wanted to be out in the open air, tending to the farm like I had always done.

I soon fell in love with Marcus Jennings, a man with the desire to start a farm. We didn't court for long before we were married. Marcus loved me and knew how to treat me right. When Daddy died Marcus got the farm and we worked it together for many years. My fantasy marriage, however, did not last long.

Colorado Springs was the closest town but we lived far enough away that most people there didn't know we even existed. I tried to stay in touch with Maude as much as possible so I ended up spending even more time in town after we were both married than I ever did as a child. I became a part of the town and got to know many of the people there, but it wasn't until I came back later in life that I would really call it my home.

Marcus and I had three children together, two girls and a boy. Tom was the oldest and always protective of his little sisters, Loraine and Amelia. After my youngest daughter was born, Marcus changed.

One afternoon, while I was at the sink preparin' supper, Marcus burst through the front door of our homestead. "Pack up your things darlin', we're movin."

I brushed my hands clean on the apron I was wearing and walked calmly over to him. "You'll wake the baby," I warned. "Now what's this about movin'?"

"I bought us some land," he said with a large grin. "Down in Pueblo."

"Marcus you're talking crazy. We don't have enough money to go buyin' land."

"We had plenty saved. Won the rest in a poker game."

"But this is my mom. You promised Daddy you'd take care of this land. What's gonna happen to it?"

"We'll sell it," Marcus said without feeling.

"But Pueblo is so far. I won't see Maude…"

He cut me off. "Well that's just an added bonus no isn't it?" he sneered. "She won't be able to tell you what a bastard I am and that husband of hers will stop fawnin over ya."

"Don't I get any say in this?" I asked. I got my answer with a sharp slap across the face. I held my hand to my burning skin and looked at my husband in shocked horror. That was the first time he had ever struck me. I told myself he was just frustrated and that it wouldn't happen again.

The new farm wasn't mentioned again in words. We silently backed up as many belongings as would fit in our wagon. We tied the animals to the back so they could follow behind.

We had to start from scratch on the new farm and the frustrations that went along with it made Marcus an unpleasant man to live with. He started drinkin' a lot more often, leaving me to do his chores as well as mine. With three young children, this often left me with more than I could handle. When I didn't do things exactly as he wanted, Marcus resorted to beatin'. I took whatever he threw at me, mainly because I was scared he'd go after the kids if I didn't. One night he proved me right.

Tommy and Loraine sat by the fire, him teaching her his new favorite game, checkers. Marcus came home and found me in the kitchen, still trying to clean up from dinner, a meal he had missed. "Ya save me some food," he asked, coming behind me. He placed his arm around my waist and drew me to him. I could smell the alcohol on his breath.

"Figured you'd be eatin' elsewhere tonight," I responded daringly. I knew of course that he would be expectin' a meal when he finally waltzed through the door, but something made me throw out his share that night.

"You're gonna regret that," he said, drawing his arm up to hit me. I dodged his blow and he hit his arm on the counter top. He left me alone long enough for me to walk calmly out of the room and to the kids. I didn't want them to see their father like that. "Come on kids, time for bed," I told them.

Tom was about to protest the end of his game when Marcus entered the room. "No darlin' let them stay up. Tom's old enough, aren't ya son?"

"Yes sir," the boy responded. "I don't need to go to bed with the girls."

"You think you're a big man now don't ya?" Marcus taunted.

Tommy stood up tall. "I am a man. And I ain't gonna let ya hit Ma no more."

That was all it took for Marcus to completely lose his cool. He struck Tommy, almost knocking him to the floor. I intervened then, not willing to let him lay another finger on my babies. "Marcus, you're drunk," I scolded. "Why don't you just go sober up and when ya get back I'll have your supper ready."

"You already messed up darlin'. Now I'm gonna remind ya what happens when you don't do what you're supposed ta."

I shuffled Tom and Loraine behind me and told them to get to bed. They remained only long enough to see me get a bloody lip.

Marcus beat me whenever he drank but I refused to forget all the good times we had before that. I held on to those memories and stayed with him so that the kids would have a pa. Tommy and the girls were the only thing that kept me goin'. I knew I couldn't leave them alone.

When Marcus finally passed out late into the night, I would sit by the fire and cry myself to sleep. I'd rarely share his bed and made sure I was up before he rose. Sometimes Tommy would wake and come down, finding me with tears in my eyes. I hated having him see me like that but it happened often.

When he was small he would crawl up onto my lap and wipe away my tears with the scarf I had knitted him. "Don't worry mama," he would whisper. "One day I'll be bigger then him and I won't let him hurt ya no more."

Years passed and the kids grew. Lori and Amelia ran off and got married without our permission. I always figured they blamed me for Marcus always drinkin' but I never thought they'd forget about me completely. But as soon as some handsome fella came along promisin' an escape, they took it. Tommy joined the military when the war broke out. I worried every day over him but had kept myself busy on the farm so I didn't think about it all the time. When I got the letter sayin' he'd been shot, I wanted to jump on the next stage out. Marcus had other plans.

"I need ya here," he insisted. "Ya can't be runnin' off. Tom has plenty of docs to care for him. They don't need a frettin' woman gettin' in their way."

"He's my son," I begged. "I have to go see him. What if he don't make it."

"Then you'll see him when he gets here in the wooden box."

I willed myself not to cry, knowing that would only worsen the situation. Under my breath, I could not help but asking "When'd you get to be so heartless." I had half hoped he would hear me but knew that it was better if he didn't. I saved myself a beatin' by keepin' quiet and stayin' home. Tommy let me know he was alright soon as he could but he didn't come home.

It took many years for me finally to work up the courage to leave my husband. One night he came home, more alcohol in him than I thought possible for one man to consume. He gave me the worst beatin' of my life that night. One that left me unconscious for who knows how many hours.

When I woke up, Marcus wasn't around. I grabbed my shawl as I stumbled out the door and wrapped it around me to fight off the chill that marked the presence of fall. I somehow managed to get on my horse and rode off, determined to never return to that farm or that man.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: My Return

Colorado Springs, 1868. I arrived just before Halloween of that year and barely recognized my old home. I'd been gone for so many years I couldn't count. My life with Marcus had started off as a fairy tale but it didn't last. Now as I walked down the desolate street that passed through the center of town I was a broken woman. I came back here looking for a familiar safety and I found the world turned upside down.

As I walked along the familiar dirt road, I found myself wondering if I'd ever have a place to call home again. I felt isolated here, as if I didn't belong. I knew what lay around each corner and who lived behind what doors. Still, every sound made me jump and every gaze forced me to face the facts. I was no longer a welcome member of the town but a stranger who some vaguely remembered.

Most of the buildings looked the same, though a few were more worn down that I remembered them. Loren Bray, my brother-in-law, owns the general store. He was kind enough to put me up. Hank Lawson still had his saloon. Myra still worked there but there were plenty of girls I didn't know. Jake Slicker, the barber, had moved his shop closer to the mercantile but it was still just as I remembered; one chair and smelling like hair tonic.

Then there were the things that had changed; things that made me in a way uneasy, but in another somewhat comforted. A new woman to town, Grace, had started a café right behind Robert E's livery. There was a new Revered and someone else working the telegraph. But the key addition for me upon my arrival was that of the clinic, which was owned and operated by a woman doctor.

I went straight to Loren, knowing he wouldn't turn me away. As I stepped onto the short step I questioned whether my feet would make it to the door. When Loren recognized my weakened state, he suggested a visit to the doctor, the woman I would later come to call my best friend.

Dr. Michaela Quinn came here from Boston and was the most opinionated and strong-willed woman I had ever seen. I would like to think that I have some of that fire in me but it pales in comparison to what Michaela has.

Loren took me too meet her, commenting that she was only "sort of" a doctor. I soon realized he only felt that way because she was a woman. I gave him a disapproving glance and the he left me to be examined. I told the doctor that I had fallen off my horse but she knew better. She didn't say it to my face but I knew just by lookin' at her that she knew. It became our code word, in an odd joking matter, later on when that same horse threw me again.

"It don't really matter what happened," I told her later. "I left him and I ain't goin back."

Dr. Quinn had her clinic in what used to be the boarding house. The woman who owned it before, Charlotte Cooper, had been my best friend during one time in my life. As I sat in what was now the examination room, I remembered many days when Charlotte and I would discuss life over a pot of stew simmering in her kitchen.

"I don't know why you sit around waitin' for him to come back," I told her one evening.

"The same reason you let Marcus hit you," she responded.

"He only does that when he's drunk," I defended. "Besides he's never done more than strike me across the face. Plenty of men do worse than that to their wives."

"And plenty of wives end up dead for unexplained circumstances," Charlotte scowled.

I then turned things back around on her. "And plenty of women end up alone for the rest of their lives waitin' on their men to come home. Ya gotta face the facts here Cahrlotte, Ethan ain't comin' back with gold. You gotta find a way to raise those kids."

"I have my boarding house," she said proudly. "We'll get by fine with this old place until Ethan comes back. Then we'll have our farm again."

Charlotte's husband Ethan had been gone eight months at that time and I still couldn't convince her that he was gone for good. While she had stopped cryin herself to sleep, she still kept hope that he'd come back to her and the kids.

After I left the clinic, only a few minor bruises to my name, I set out to start my new life as a free and independent woman. Getting that independence, however, was slightly more difficult than I had imagined. I'd left the only home I had in the world with not a penny to my name. The only things I had were the clothes on my back and the hope that the people in town would soon consider me a part of their lives.

Loren was reluctant to let me stay at the store with him, and I don't blame him really. We'd had a long and complicated history between us. Me showin' up was a big shock, I could tell. He disapproved of the way I lived my life before but disapproved even more when I tried to fix things. "A little disagreement isn't a reason to break up a marriage," he told me.

I was astonished to think Maude had gone through anything similar to what I had. "Is that how is was between you and Maude?"

Loren refused to let me in. "Your sister was a good woman. We respected each other. That's all I'll say about that."

It wasn't until later that I learned any more. I met up with Dr. Quinn at the cemetery where I was visitin' my sister's grave. "We were close," I told her. "For the longest time all we had was each other. Then Loren proposed to me."

"He proposed?"

"Things just weren't the same after that."

My new friend was silent, not knowing what to make of this situation. I left her to contemplate things, with the assurance that one day I'd let her in and know more of the scattered past. I went straight to Loren at that moment, needing confirmation that only he could give. "After all these years," I began. "You're still in love with me."

He ran his hand across his mouth and rolled his eyes away, trying to avoid the situation. He'd grown old and was less tolerant of most things. But the young man I knew was still in there somewhere, just waiting for someone to ask him to come out. "Ya can't hide behind this grumpy façade," I told him. "Now tell me the truth. Do you still love me."

"I told ya back then I'd never stop lovin' you," Loren said softly.

"Then why'd you marry Maude? Why'd you put her through that?"

"I figured if I couldn't have you, Maude was the next best thing."

"You weren't that cold-hearted."

"I knew what it was like to be turned down by the person you love most in the world," Loren finally admitted. "I saw how much she cared for me, though I never could se just why. But she loved me and I couldn't bear to hurt her."

"But she knew you still loved me. Don't ya think that hurt her?"

"You don't get to just waltz back in here and tell me 'bout all the mistakes I made. I did what had to be done. Don't go tryin' to make me regret it just casue you do."

"But don't you regret it?"

"Maude and I were happy enough," Loren maintained. "Nothin' else much matters now that it's all over and done with."

I decided not to pursue matters further. "Dr. Quinn has asked us to supper," I told him. "Will you come?"

"Aww I don't wanna eat with her," Loren grumbled. I simply looked him in the eye and asked him to do it for me. He turned away before finally answering. "Aww fine, I'll go."

Loren and drove out to Michaela's homestead where we were greeted by her three adopted children, Matthew, Brian, and Colleen. I looked them all over, noting how much they had changed since I'd seen them last. These were Charlotte's children, left to Michaela when she died. They were my best friend's children and at this point almost strangers to me. Sully gave a short wave from his chair in the corner. I noticed how he and Loren avoided one another.

Michaela came to the door behind the kids, wiping her hands on her apron. "Loren, I'm glad you decided to come," she smiled broadly.

"Dinner will be ready soon," Colleen announced.

The meal went well and afterwards Loren played his harmonica and we all sang songs together. Everything was joyful, something I hadn't experienced in a long time. Then a knock sounded at the door. Sully went to answer it. As he slid the door open, I heard an all-to-familiar voice. "I'm sorry to bother you mister but I'm lookin for someone and when I asked in town they said…"

I jumped up from my seat and grasped the table in front of me. "Marcus!"

"Dorothy…" I saw his face light up when he saw me. The desire to win me back burning in his eyes.

I summoned all the courage I had left in me to try and get him to leave. "Go away, I don't want to see you. Leave me alone"

"Dorothy please, just listen to me." Marcus stepped forward, attempting an entrance into the house.

"You can't come in. I'm sorry," Sully told him, holding his hand up to block the way.

Loren stepped in at my defense as well. "You heard her, she don't want to see you Marcus."

"Loren?" Marcus asked, astonished to see him with me but also noticing how he had changed over the years.

Though I could tell Loren wanted nothing more than to knock Marcus unconscious, he remained composed. "You bets just go home now. You have no business here."

Michaela too tried to make the situation disappear. "Mr. Jennings, I think you better leave."

But Marcus wouldn't give up. "Dorothy, please. I'm so sorry darling. I don't know what go into me. It won't happen again."

"I've heard that before."

"You've never left me before"

"And I'm not goin back."

"Please Dorothy. As God and this good people as my witness, I won't ever do it again. I…I don't want to loose you. I need you. I can't take living without you."

I don't know if Michaela could sense me weakening or if she simply couldn't tolerate Marcus being in her house. Whatever the case, she was growing more and more frustrated, and you could hear it in her tone. "Please, get out of my house Mr. Jennings."

Before I knew what was happening, Marcus had pulled a gun out of his pocket. My heart skipped a beat when I thought about everything he was capable of. He could kill me, or Loren, or as things were Michaela, Sully, or the children. Him killing me I'd thought of plenty of times and had come to expect that one day it would happen. But any harm done to Loren or my new friends was intolerable. The threat alone made me despise his actions.

I could feel my blood getting' hotter as he stood in front of me with that gun. Then I noticed the look on his face and I began to soften when he spoke. "You don't believe me, you can shoot me right now. If I ever lay a hand on you again, you can kill me. Go on take it! Take it! I'd rather die then to ever hurt you again. Please, just talk to me."

"Put the gun away," I insisted. My barriers crumbling, I stepped towards the door.

"Dorothy, you don't have to," Michaela attempted to stop me.

"It's alright," I said. "I'll be right outside that door."

Once outside, I followed Marcus away from the homestead some distance, hoping to assure our privacy. He grabbed my hand gently and led me behind a lark pine. He stepped in to kiss me but I put my hand up in protest. "Come on Dorothy," he complained. "I said I was sorry."

"You said you wanted to talk," I said, standing my ground. "So talk."

"Don't you miss what we used to have?"

"Course I do. That's why I ain't willin' to live like we been these past years. I'm tired of rememberin'."

"But we can have good times again," Marcus proposed. "You know them wild times we had before the kids. Those were good."

"I don't know that the kids were ever the problem."

"Please Dorothy," He further begged. "Come home with me." That time, when he leaned in, I did not stop him.

As he came towards me, I felt my stomach churn. I wanted to protest, to push him away, but I couldn't.


End file.
